Todd Goldman is a hack, throw rocks at
him.
April 7, 2007
There are few things I hate more than stealing someone else's hard work
- and for some goddamned reason, when it comes to comics, theft of
intellectual property and t-shirt designers seem to go hand in hand.
I've found Rippy, and versions of him, on fly-by-night t-shirt shops
before. I've also seen the comics of people I know being hoisted up
with no apology by the thief. It's infuriating and it's an uphill
battle.
But at least those assholes hadn't built a small empire and decent
wealth off the work of others.
Have you heard of Todd Goldman? He also goes by Todd Goliath and he's
the "genius" behind such shirt designs as the "Boys Are Dumb - Throw
Rocks At Them" shirts from his company, David and Goliath Tees.
He's also got a line of shirts called Goodbye Kitty, meant to be a
parody of Hello Kitty, that is actually just an image that's been on the
web since the mid-90s.
Yeah. Someone ELSE drew that cat first.
Oh, but that's not all. See, Todd is also a painter. The Jack Gallery
in Los Angeles did a recent exhibition entitled Golddigger of his
works. Amongst his paintings in their online selection was this piece:
I like that piece a lot. Of course, I enjoyed it even more when it was
this:
See, the second image was a comic from the strip, Purple Pussy by Dave Kelly. In
face, it was the September 19, 2001
strip. The dialogue is almost the same. The layout is EXACTLY the
same. The tail is the same. So are the eyelashes. All that's missing
is the bow on her head. Goldman barely changed the text.
This is not the first time Goldman's been accused of ripping other
people off. His character, Eve L.
bears an uncanny resemblance to Roman Dirge's Lenore. The idea of
Goodbye Kitty was something I saw years ago in a Evan Dorkin comic book.
Most of the shirts have slogans you've seen on other shirts for years.
In the past I've been very critical of some of Dave Kelly's work on
KeenSpot. Some of his other projects, like Living in Greytown (no
longer online) and his animation at Something Awful called the Flash
Tub are pure genius (if severely NOT safe for work). But one thing
is for sure: Dave is an amazing artist, one of the best who's touched
webcomics, and this isn't right. Dave Kelly's art deserves to be
respected, and slapping your own name on it and hanging it in a gallery
isn't respect.
Why am I posting about this? Someone
told Kelly about it after she'd seen the piece at the Wentworth
Gallery and then he made it public. And Dave Kelly is known for
shying away from the spotlight. Also, this is something everyone who
does some form of art has to be concerned about. And honestly, anyone
who takes someone ELSE'S hard work and tries to pass it off as their own
deserves to be called out.
And the consumer deserves to know where art is coming from. And the
real artist deserves the praise and support, whether it's
criticial or financial, that the piece moves the consumer to offer. And
I think everyone knows how enraging it is to work hard and have someone
else take credit for it.
Well, maybe everyone except Todd Goldman. -R
